Shrewsbury High senior Matt Ward’s exploits on the ice during the Colonials’ undefeated run to the Division 3 state championship last winter earned him Hometeam Boys’ Hockey Player of the Year, and now Ward will make a run at being the best player in Central Mass. in two sports.

As a fourth-year starter, Ward is the only contributor left from Shrewsbury’s exciting run to the Central-West Division 2 boys’ lacrosse title in 2014, and the only active CMass player outside of Grafton with a title under his belt.

“He’s going to be one of the best in the area, no doubt about it,” said Shrewsbury coach Nate Skermont, who also coaches Ward in club lacrosse. “But I think people are going to be surprised all the work he did over the summer to be even better than what I thought he would be coming into the season.”

Ward was the Colonials’ top scorer last season, with 44 goals and 14 assists to roughly match his 60-point output as a sophomore playing second fiddle behind Joe Buduo, Shrewsbury’s other most recent hockey-lacrosse superstar.

“Freshman year, nobody knew him. Sophomore year, he had Buduo as a senior, and Matt got the second-best pole,” Skermont said. “Last year, Matty was more of the focal point, and it was really his first time seeing a lot of double teams.”

“This year, we’re looking for him to do a lot of different things. He’s OK not lighting up the scoreboard knowing that he’s drawing double teams or people are cheating his way,” Skermont added. “He’s fine taking an assist or being a decoy.”

The early results have been promising, as Ward posted back-to-back four-goal games in wins over St. Peter-Marian and Westboro.

“He gets it, and he gets that we’re going to ride him even harder this year, because he is the leader,” Skermont said.

Skermont said Ward had the benefit of playing with eight future college players on the 2014 title team and learned the preparation necessary to become elite.

“We never game him that ‘Oh, he’s a freshman’ (treatment),” Skermont said. “He never got it easy, but he’s one of those guys that you can coach that way.”

The tough love paid off, as Ward is headed to play next year at Division 2 St. Anselm in New Hampshire with Seven Hills club teammate Griffin Shoemaker, whose Littleton squad edged Shrewsbury, 7-6, on Tuesday.

After Shrewsbury dipped to 8-12 last year, Ward will lead the charge in trying to get the Colonials back into the playoffs for the third time in his four seasons.

“Last year was obviously tough, but I would rather have gone through last year to develop all the guys on the team than to play a schedule that gets us into districts and we don’t go anywhere,” Skermont said.

Part of the reason Ward hasn’t reached the 100 points in a season is the level of competition that Skermont schedules. Outside the rough and tumble Mid-Wach A, Shrewsbury also plays St. John’s, Grafton, Minnechaug, Westfield, Sharon, Marshfield, and all the top teams in Mid-Wach B.

Ward will have help this year from junior long-stick midfielder Chris Campbell, who Skermont calls the best in CMass and a future Division 1 player, along with a deep defense headlined by Jack Tepper and St. John’s transfer Nick Perron.

“I’m very excited about the poles that we have,” Skermont said. “The defense that we’re running, it’s going to be hard for teams to put up a lot of points.”

“What’s good right now is that Matty’s the focal point, but that means all these guys that are underclassmen are getting so many (open) looks,” Skermont said.

Scoring Tiger

At Littleton, Ward’s future college teammate, Shoemaker, is gearing up for a big senior season after leading the Tigers to an 18-3 record last year while earning Mid-Wach B MVP and Telegram & Gazette Super Team honors.

Shoemaker has been one of the most prolific scoring midfielders in Central Mass. over the past few years, finishing third in the area last year with 107 points, including 70 goals, which is a exceptional pace of more than five points per game.

He reached a round 100 points as a sophomore and entered the season with 263 career points, making it all but certain that he reaches 300.

“You hear all of the superlatives and the accolades, and you look at the stats and go ‘Oh, wow!’ ” Littleton coach Mike Blanchard said. “What people don’t see, though, is that Griffin wins almost every conditioning drill that we do, and they don’t see how hard he works at every detail in every drill that we do.”

Littleton is 3-1, the only loss coming on the road by one goal to Eastern Mass. power Concord-Carlisle — a fitting opponent give that the Tigers are aligned with the Patriots in the challenging Central-East Division 3 bracket for the postseason.

With nearly the entire team back, and its star player now a senior, fourth-year veteran, Littleton is hoping to match last season’s breakout success.

“We only lost one starter, and when you’re in that situation, it bodes well for the next year,” Blanchard said. “The team is pretty excited about this season.”

The Tigers lost a starter, but also got one back in Danny Angell, who was injured for all of last season and joins Jared Collari and Will Scott in attack.

Shoemaker has plenty of scorers to pass to, which helps explain his 99 career assists entering the year. Littleton also has another quality midfielder in junior Anthony Rausa and a rising faceoff ace in sophomore Gavin Bergeron.

“With Griffin and Anthony (Rausa) running the midfield together, that helps both of them because it’s really hard for teams to key in on one,” Blanchard said.

Littleton has won a playoff game in each of Shoemaker’s first three years, but this could be the year the Tigers are finally equipped to make a run.

—Contact Carl Setterlund at sports@telegram.com. Follow him on Twitter @tgsports.